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I think he has 2 more 6 month visits and after that 1 time per year for a short while.

I'm so relived to see a decade of worry finally coming to an end. Realistically it will always be in the...

I believe the success rate for tethering is around 3 in 4. More or less.

The night before the surgery we had a meeting with Dr. Newton. Because Scott's curve had reached 63° he felt that fusion...

Hi Ed! Long time no see.

The X-ray shows if a tether breaks. Normally the screws are perpendicular but the tethers are so tight that if one snaps the screw holding it will point either up or...

In case anyone was wondering Scott can't feel the tethers in his back. Although I imagine that they limit his motion it's not enough for him to notice.

Dr. Newton told us that sooner or later...

Scott’s History
2007 - Age 4 - Rib hump noticed but scoliosis not measured
2008 - Age 5 - 11°
2009 - Age 6 - 14°
2010 - Age 7 - 19° (Torso rotation exercises began just before 7th birthday)...

Ya know at first we started measuring him against the wall and then we got busy and stopped doing it. I'm almost ashamed to say I'm not sure how much he grew over the last 6 months, haha.

Scott is a little over 5 '5".
His older brother is 17 and 5' 9".

I'm just 5' 7.5" and his mom is 5'4".

By the look of his frame we suspect he will be as big as his brother or maybe just a...

In Scott's case with 10° progression in one month Dr. Newton said it was time for fusion or tethering. Maybe there was a 3rd surgical option, I'm not sure. But it was time for immediate surgical...

Yeah we were very pleased but I'm not going to get cocky. Tethering doesn't always work but so far it's a really good sign.

Scott went from 63° to 28°. If he had been fused I'm not certain the...

Scott had his 6 month post-op checkup yesterday in San Diego. His curve measured 28° which was the same as his 2 week post-up. His 2 week and 6 month x-rays looked almost identical except (to my...

Anterior spinal overgrowth of the thoracic spine may not be involved in the initiation of adolescent idiopathic scoliosis

OBJECTIVE:
To compare vertebral morphology among adolescent idiopathic...

If they find Syringomyelia or Chiari that can be serious. But with the incidental stuff it's hard to know if it means anything.

Scott's Hydromyelia is minor and it may (or may not) have had...

Are you sure that's not backwards? Maybe different studies produced different results.

This is from your link.



I should note Scott always had a lot of rotation and he does have a neural...

Long story short neural axis abnormalities may be a risk factor for Scoliosis but they don't tell doctors much about the type of curve or severity of the condition.

Neural Axis Abnormalities in...

Yeah this stuff tends to take forever. I think FDA approval typically takes 10 years. So if tomorrow scientists confirmed that Scoliosis was caused by inflammation and a specific type of...

25-year study shows that incidence of type 1 diabetes is increasing by more than 3 percent per year in Europe


I doubt long term studies like this are being done for Scoliosis. Nobody knows if...

For the first time I'm hopeful because of the Zebrafish study.

If that study is confirmed it would be a major leap forward in the understanding of Scoliosis.

Scientists have been studying...

We're all guessing so Pooka's bet that AIS is caused by heredity is as good as any other.

However we know that infections cause spinal deformity. Polio, Tuberculosis, Vertebral Osteomyelitis and...

1) You are correct, the Yale team's results could be wrong.
2) This needs to replicated a few times for confirmation.

However they didn't simply show that a resistant starch diet ameliorated...

I'm not sure what that Dr. said on the radio station but scientists are lot further along than that.

This just in: Yale researchers ameliorate Lupus with resistant starch dietary intervention in...

In AIS the inflammation might be in the spine but the root of the problem could in theory be somewhere else.

In the case of Rheumatoid Arthritis it appears that the problem is in the stomach even...

If inflammation plays a role it starts to make sense.

1) More inflammation = more curve progression
2) More curve progression = more inflammation

So maybe it's just a feedback loop.

The...

Now I remember!

I must have missed that. Do you have a link to that study? That's interesting.

Because of the discovery of the Syrinx in Scott's MRI I think there is a good chance his case was congenital. This...

Hypothesis 1) The population in the British Isles selected for genes that cause potentially fatal spinal deformities in children.
Hypothesis 2) Low levels of Vitamin D.

Taking into account the...